Chuck Sweeny: Legislators caught in crosshairs on gun bills

Now that the Illinois Legislature has solved the pension crisis, stopped spending more than the state collects in taxes and has put Illinois on a sound financial path for the next 40 years, lawmakers have turned their attention to banning guns.

Now that the Illinois Legislature has solved the pension crisis, stopped spending more than the state collects in taxes and has put Illinois on a sound financial path for the next 40 years, lawmakers have turned their attention to banning guns.

That first paragraph was a joke, of course. Illinois has NOT dealt with these serious concerns. Instead, legislators are changing the subject and showboating their attempt to ban sales of so-called assault weapons.

The legislation passed the Senate Public Health Committee on a 6-3 party-line vote, but it was not called for a vote in the full Senate “because the Democrats were a couple of votes short,” said Sen. Dave Syverson, R-Rockford.

The bill would have outlawed sales of several types of guns. A companion bill would limit magazines to 10 rounds. People who own such weapons could keep them but would have to register them with authorities. The ammo clips would have to be registered, too.

The restrictions would not affect people who ignore laws.

State and city bans against certain firearms are worthless and potentially dangerous. Illinoisans could cross a state line, buy the weapons and bring them home, just as some do with fireworks, which are illegal to use in Illinois.

If you’ve ever seen the brisk business at the fireworks shops in southern Wisconsin, you know what I mean. In the run-up to Independence Day and New Year’s Eve, many of the cars in the parking lots have Illinois plates.

Wisconsin used to ban the sales of oleomargarine because of the strong dairy farmers’ lobby. So Wisconsin residents trying to save money simply travelled across the state line to South Beloit, where tiny stores on Illinois 2 advertised “OLEO!” on large billboards. Or they’d drive down to Rockford supermarkets on Saturdays to buy shopping-cart loads of margarine. As a 16-year-old bag boy at Jewel, I loaded vast quantities of the stuff into their cars and trucks.

Chicago already has very strict laws against gun ownership and yet it logged more than 500 homicides in 2012, most involving guns. The only laws that would have any effect on guns would be national laws. And there is no national consensus on what, if anything, to do about further regulation of gun ownership.

Syverson says the bill considered last week in Springfield was too broad, and he predicts that proponents “will come back in the spring session with a tighter definition of assault weapons and maybe try to tack it on to concealed carry legislation they’ll have to pass this spring.”

If you remember, Judge Richard Posner of the 7th U.S. Court of Appeals has told the state to pass a concealed-carry bill, which would bring Illinois in line with the other 49 states.

“Chances are pretty good that the Democratic leaders will try to combine the concealed-carry bill with a ban on assault weapons,” Syverson said. “Then how can you vote for concealed carry if you have to vote for an assault-weapons bill at the same time?”

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If that happens, Syverson and other opponents of gun control “will just vote no on concealed carry, knowing that if it doesn’t pass, the court may order a more liberal form of concealed carry.”